The term "style" has been displaced in the art lexicon by phrases such as "signifying practice." Yet distinctiveness, elegance, even perversity of expression continue to enjoy a lively currency in the art world.

The curatorial consortium of Pamela Edmonds, Ingrid Jenkner, Robin Metcalfe, and Robert Zingone was organized to explore this phenomenon from distinct curatorial perspectives. Treating "style" as an art packaging paradigm, a sign of social identity, a gendered construct or the badge of fashionability, the four selectors each presented two or three works of art that embody one or more of these principles.